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I don't think that is the same response - I think your dog is getting excited because you're signaling you want to play. If you pretend to put a treat under a c

I don't think that is the same response - I think your dog is getting excited because you're signaling you want to play. If you pretend to put a treat under a cup and lift the cup to show no treat is present the dog won't be amused, they will be annoyed. I'm not sure dogs have a sense of humor in the same way primates do.

mod 5y ago
I don't think that would be humorous to a human, either. Intriguing perhaps, but then I expect most dogs would be intrigued as well.
- bryanrasmussen 5y ago
  But if you have two dogs, and one dog is contentedly chewing on a bone, and then you trick the other one - will the contented dog be amused?
cbogie 5y ago
that’s not really low stakes for a dog, or anyone hungry for that matter.
mellosouls 5y ago
I obviously don't know your relationship with dogs, but my initial reaction was that anybody who knows them well would disagree; not only do they have a sense of humour but they will also grin to show it. Admittedly, this is can be somewhat off-putting because the smile doesn't reach their eyes, so perhaps they are just mimicking us, but whatever it is they are indicating an understanding that a joke is intended, beyond normal happiness and play.
- Mordisquitos 5y ago
  On the one hand, we cannot assume that animal expressions have any relation to similar expressions in humans. See for example how the misunderstanding of facial expressions between great apes and humans (in both directions) has often lead to violence, and they're our closest relatives. However, I have a pet* theory that the long evolutionary history of dogs with humans has little by little made their facial expressions converge towards reasonable approximations of human expressions. Which of the ancestors of modern dogs were more likely to survive in the company of humans: those whose expression looked human-happy when the dog was feeling a positive canine emotion? Or those whose expression looked human-happy when they were feeling aggressive, fearful, disappointed, etc? * No pun intended
  - ludamad 5y ago
    I'm always curious with just how much my husky uses her paw to "activate" things. We definitely reinforce the notion by helping her out with whatever she paws, but it does seem like a cultural thing she's learned rather than the more dextrous bite they have. In this case it's pretty mundane probably, she's using something more expressive to humans and it's happened to work well, but it still imparts on me that a dog living among humans picks up some pretty different signalling
- thechao 5y ago
  My current dog is awesome but he does not have a sense of humor. Whenever I play jokes on him, he just gets concerned.

mod 5y ago

I don't think that would be humorous to a human, either. Intriguing perhaps, but then I expect most dogs would be intrigued as well.

bryanrasmussen 5y ago
But if you have two dogs, and one dog is contentedly chewing on a bone, and then you trick the other one - will the contented dog be amused?

cbogie 5y ago

that’s not really low stakes for a dog, or anyone hungry for that matter.

mellosouls 5y ago

I obviously don't know your relationship with dogs, but my initial reaction was that anybody who knows them well would disagree; not only do they have a sense of humour but they will also grin to show it. Admittedly, this is can be somewhat off-putting because the smile doesn't reach their eyes, so perhaps they are just mimicking us, but whatever it is they are indicating an understanding that a joke is intended, beyond normal happiness and play.

Mordisquitos 5y ago
On the one hand, we cannot assume that animal expressions have any relation to similar expressions in humans. See for example how the misunderstanding of facial expressions between great apes and humans (in both directions) has often lead to violence, and they're our closest relatives. However, I have a pet* theory that the long evolutionary history of dogs with humans has little by little made their facial expressions converge towards reasonable approximations of human expressions. Which of the ancestors of modern dogs were more likely to survive in the company of humans: those whose expression looked human-happy when the dog was feeling a positive canine emotion? Or those whose expression looked human-happy when they were feeling aggressive, fearful, disappointed, etc? * No pun intended
- ludamad 5y ago
  I'm always curious with just how much my husky uses her paw to "activate" things. We definitely reinforce the notion by helping her out with whatever she paws, but it does seem like a cultural thing she's learned rather than the more dextrous bite they have. In this case it's pretty mundane probably, she's using something more expressive to humans and it's happened to work well, but it still imparts on me that a dog living among humans picks up some pretty different signalling
thechao 5y ago
My current dog is awesome but he does not have a sense of humor. Whenever I play jokes on him, he just gets concerned.